Are You Registered to Vote?

I found out five minutes ago that, despite having changed my address with the DMV when I moved a year ago, I’m not registered at the correct address to vote. Since today is the last day for voter registrations to be mailed in (they must have today’s postmark in order to count for the upcoming November election), I figured I’d better get on that, and put my vote where my mouth is.

There. Now I am ready to participate in democracy, and exercise one of the most important rights of my American citizenship. I’d better go catch up on the entirely too many propositions on the ballot this fall.

3 Replies to “Are You Registered to Vote?”

Just a reminder to everyone out there: with the flurry of re-registering that goes on right before elections, it’s possible that your name will get lost from the rolls at your polling place. DON’T PANIC if the volunteer can’t find your name. You still have the absolute right to cast a provisional ballot (at one polling place, kids, just one).

People working the polls have different levels of expertise, some paid attention during the training, some didn’t. But know that you have the right to cast the provisional ballot, and if they give you static, don’t budge till you get one.

(Oh, and by the way, if you have an absentee ballot that you end up not mailing back in a timely enough fashion, it can be deposited at any polling place WITHIN Los Angeles County -assuming you’re an LA County voter, of course – on Election Day. Alternatively, you can take it with you and surrender it to your actual polling place and cast a ballot – NOT a provisional ballot, a regular ballot – on the day of. This confuses some poll workers, as I found out in the last primary. But it’s good law.)